Fisc

FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT FISC - PAGE 3

As 'copious inflows' in the words of the finance minister, P Chidambaram threaten to become still more copious, it is clear ad hoc measures, some tweaking here, some tweaking there, will not do. At best, they can buy us time and at a cost that may prove prohibitive, long-term. But if tightening access to external commercial borrowings and participatory notes, relaxing the regimen for outward flows, intervention by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to buy up dollars, followed by sterilisation or buying up the resultant increase in rupees etc will not do the trick, what will?

the new fiscal has been good for telecom services consumers as prices of international calls have dropped by upto 20 per cent. however, the government has hiked postal tariff between 25 to 100 per cent on certain items. following an order by the telecom regulatory authority of india (trai), bharat sanchar nigam ltd (bsnl) slashed tariff on calls from india to the us by 20 per cent from april 1. tariff on calls from india to europe were reduced by 27 per cent, while rates to neighbouring saarc countries have become cheaper by 18 per cent.

NEW DELHI: The finance ministry said that the government will not exceed the gross market borrowing for the fiscal, and described the additional Rs 4,000 crore borrowing as a one-off affair. Ashok Jha, secretary, economic affairs in the finance ministry, told reporters that there was no cash crunch at the Centre, as the advance tax collections have been very robust. "The borrowing went through as there was enough liquidity in the market, and it also provided us with some additional cash reserves," he said.

MUMBAI: Favouring a soft interest rate bias, SBI on Wednesday aims to reduce its NPAs to 2% of its advances by this fiscal end. "We are targeting to bring down net NPAs to 2% of the net advances this fiscal," SBI chairman AK Purwar said after a review meeting of banks. Public sector banks on an aggregate reduced their NPAs to 4.5%, mainly due to the drastic reduction of bad loans by SBI and its associate banks. PSU banks now target 2% average NPA this fiscal. SBI has brought down its NPAs to 4.5% in '02-03 from 5.6% in '01-02.

NEW DELHI: The Bajaj family feud may be heading for a rapprochement before the fisc runs out, with the meetings between solicitors representing the two sides "going off well". According to sources close to the family, "in a few more meetings" the two solicitors ? Prakash Mehta of Malvi Ranchhodas & Co representing Rahul, Sekhar, Madhur and Niraj Bajaj; Rashmikant of Federal & Rashmikant representing Shishir Bajaj ? "are likely to come up with the 'terms of agreement' for the 'dispute' to be referred to the two mediators".

MUMBAI: The Reserve Bank of India has said that the fiscal deficit position is expected to be better than the budget estimates and the rate of inflation was expected to fall, despite the recent give-aways in indirect taxes that are expected to cost the exchequer several thousand crores. "On the issue of fiscal impact (of recent policy measures), I had discussions with the ministry and the current assessment, even after all these announcements , is that the real deficit and fiscal deficit for the current year would be better than what they were considered in the budget," said YV Reddy, governor, Reserve Bank of India speaking at the sidelines of a function in Mumbai.

MUMBAI: The Democratic Front government in Maharashtra would make payment of Rs 350 crore to the cotton growers by March-end, marketing minister Harshwardhan Patil told newspersons here on Friday. "The finance minister has already made Rs 200 crore available and payments to cotton growers in Yavatmal district of Vidarbha have already started," the minister said. The payments, covering about 35 lakh farmers mainly in Vidarbha, Khandesh and Marathwada regions, would be made through cheques, he said.

NEW DELHI: The government has decided to pre-pay a host of bi-lateral loans this fiscal as part of an overall plan to retire relatively costly external debt. The finance ministry has initiated an exercise to identify and retire a large number of smaller outstanding bilateral loans from several sources, as it sees no financial sense in carrying them on the books until maturity. The swelling foreign exchange reserves have provided the government plenty of comfort to extinguish part of its external debt.

WASHINGTON: Warning that India's high fiscal deficit was "not sustainable", the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has said that a more efficient revenue collection and tax administration, a wider tax base and reduction in subsidies will help improve the fiscal position of the country. However, it lauded India's economic growth in excess of 7% achieved last year and said a growth of 10% a year was both necessary and feasible. "Tackling the fiscal deficit has to be an important priority.

NEW DELHI: Punjab National Bank (PNB) is working on a plan to bring down its non-performing assets to zero percentage by the end of this financial year. This was stated by the bank's chairman and managing director SS Kohli at a signing ceremony with PeopleSoft and TCS. "We hope to become a zero-NPA bank by the end of '04-05," said Mr Kohli. As of March 31, '03, the bank's ratio of net NPAs to net advances was 0.98 as against 3.86 a year earlier. PNB currently has an NPA coverage of 91%, ie, 91% of the bad loans have been provided for. The bank is aiming at recovery and active monitoring of its loan portfolio to keep a check on it. Even for the proposed merger with IFCI, PNB has expressed its desire to take over the quality assets of IFCI ?